In related art, merchants profile users based on information known to those merchants, and target advertisements to those users based on the profiles of those users. These related art systems, however, do not locate deficiencies in the information known to those merchants, or request information to fill those deficiencies from the users. In addition, a user has very little control over if, or how, her profile information is used. In some instances, when the user accesses a merchant portal, the user may be asked to “agree” to share her profile information in order to continue using the merchant portal's services. However, the user is usually not told with whom the merchant plans to share her profile information, or under what circumstances will the sharing be carried out. In addition, in such systems in the related art, while the merchant retains flexibility to share the user's profile information with multiple advertisers or merchants without having to request permission from the user again, the advertisers and merchants are faced with ineffective advertising because they may have to pay for advertisements presented to users who might have no interest in their services or products.